Sustainability

“Albury – Our Future”: a community sustainability strategy

Where are we up to?

It would seem that here we have another study/community strategy which is going nowhere fast while costing the ratepayers significant amounts of money.  It’s definitely a worthwhile thing to do to prepare the city for the future but what has been achieved?

As far back as July 1993 we had a report “Sustainability – Our Future in Balance.  Actions for Albury – Wodonga” prepared by R Thwaites for the Albury Wodonga Region Planning Advisory Committee.  Albury Council had a representative on the Committee.

In late 2008, Albury City set up eight Community of Practice Teams (COP)and 16 members of the public gave considerable amounts of their time to be part of the teams to look at the issues and provide feedback to Council on sustainability.  By early 2010, Council had undertaken a review of the work done by the COPs and decided that they would be disbanded and another approach taken.

Alistair Buchan, who had been Council’s Sustainability Officer, left and Council established a dedicated Sustainability and Environment Team headed by Matthew Dudley.  An advisory committee was formed and this was headed by Councillors Angus and Betteridge.

By the end of 2011 the draft sustainability strategy went on public display and 3 community forums were held.  Council’s own documentation states “ This report is to be placed on AlburyCity website up until the release of the final Albury – Our Future over the ensuing weeks.  To that end AlburyCity will use the guidance of the committee to finalise Albury – Our Future for consideration by Council at its next meeting.  The final strategy will be placed on the AlburyCity website early 2012”.

It seems that the committee has not met since September 2011 and the strategy has not been finalised as at July 2012.  So what are we getting for our money?  Lots of words but not much action!

What are the issues regarding sustainability and our city?

The three most important are water, energy and waste.

The draft strategy makes some claims that water usage has dropped but it does not take into account water restrictions or annual rainfall.  Obviously when restrictions are in force or there has been high summer rainfall, water use will fall because most water is used for garden watering.  To be sustainable, and to allow for some population growth, average consumption must fall but it must come about as a result of people changing what they do.  The Council must encourage people to change their habits by planting more water friendly gardens for example using native species with low water requirements.  Council could set an example by using native species as opposed to exotics as much as possible.  Lawns are huge users of water and we need to minimise the areas of our gardens planted to lawn. 

Council could use the water bills to educate ratepayers by giving examples of typical water consumption for various household types and garden sizes.  The price should be more sensitive to the amount used and should rise steeply once a certain amount of water has been used.

In November 2006 the Natural Resource Management Ministerial Council, consisting of Federal, State and Territory Water Ministers, endorsed a set of National Guidelines for Residential Customers’ Water Accounts.  The model accounts provide comparative information to show how a consumer compares to others.  They would be a strong educational tool when trying to get people to change their habits.

Water tanks have become popular but one frequently sees a house with a very large roof area and a small tank that would not be able to store sufficient water to cope with a moderate storm event.  The NSW Government Basix guidelines need to be upgraded in line with performance and achievement to date.  Albury Council should lobby hard to have changes made to State legislation if it is not achieving the things the city believes are needed.

Energy consumption has continued to rise in Albury and the costs to Council and ratepayers is increasing rapidly with large rises in electricity prices.  Modification of things such as street lighting should be examined to see how much Council can save.  For ratepayers, good house design and energy saving measures are essential.  The Basix concept is good but more can be done and Council must encourage the use of photovoltaic cells.

Waste generation is critical and higher charges are already impacting on ratepayers.  We need to focus on the 3 Rs – reduce, reuse and recycle.  So far we have focussed mostly on the recycle option but this is the last step in the process.  Firstly we should educate consumers to buy goods with less packaging and to avoid plastic bags.  Then we should reuse packaging as much as possible  before we finally recycle it.  The process of recycling uses a significant amount of energy with transport and processing of the materials.  Household composting is the best way to recycle organic materials.  A council scheme is definitely second best.

How can I help on Council?

I am a science graduate and have worked in water and wastewater treatment for many years.  I ran a successful consulting company specialising in environmental matters with training and dangerous goods as other parts of the business.

As a consultant I worked in Canada, Greece, France, Brazil and Malaysia advising companies and training staff.  I was responsible for obtaining environmental approval for a French company to build a factory near Lara in Victoria to produce chemicals necessary for the treatment of sewerage and industrial wastewater.